Land cuffs on 10 frauds

Bhubaneswar: Police today arrested 10 persons for allegedly cheating a businessman of Rs 2 crore on the pretext of providing him land near Sakhigopal in Puri district.

The accused have been identified as Srinivas Pradhan, Chitta Ranjan Pradhan, Deepak Sahu, Sukanta Parida alias Kashi Prasad Modi, Pravat Sahu, Satya Narayan Das, Sanjib Mohanty, Saroj Khuntia, Bijay Behera and Jitendra Sahu. The police said all of them were residents of Bhubaneswar and its outskirts.

The police said mastermind Sukanta, along with Satya Narayan, had contacted the businessman, Suryakanta Das, and promised to sell 25 acres near Sakhigopal. Later, the duo roped in another eight persons, who claimed that the land shown to the businessman belonged to them.

“I paid the money in phases through bank cheques. They showed the plot but never sold it to me. When I asked for refund of the money, they did not pay any heed,” Das said. He has lodged a complaint with Nayapalli police.

Investigation by the police revealed that Sukanta used to work as a mediator in a number of land deals.

“Sukanta had made a false patta (revenue document) to establish that a portion of the land belonged to him. Besides, he had also made a fake voter identity card to establish that his name was Kashi Modi,” said a cop.

The group is also allegedly involved in fraudulent sale of a few plots. “We are trying to verify their antecedents,” said inspector in-charge of Nayapalli police station Suryamani Pradhan.

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